Myagdi, October 27
Residents of Beni Bazaar, the district headquarters of Myagdi, are facing a drinking water shortage after floods and landslides damaged the water supply pipeline earlier this month.
The damage caused by heavy rainfall and landslides in the second week of October has sharply reduced water supplies to the town, leaving residents struggling to meet their daily needs.
Ramesh Giri, chairperson of the Beni Drinking Water and Sanitation Users’ Committee, said the town requires more than 20 litres of water per second, but the current supply has fallen to just eight litres per second.
The committee supplies drinking water to around 25,000 people in 1,200 households across wards 2, 7 and 8 of Beni Municipality, he said.
The rain-triggered disasters damaged a 14-kilometre pipeline that previously supplied water from the Dandakharaka and Rithakharaka spring sources in Annapurna Rural Municipality-8. The pipeline, which had supplied 22 to 25 litres of water per second, has been out of operation for a month.
With landslides threatening sections of the pipeline route along the Khoriya and Khareni hillsides in Beni, the committee has begun laying a new three-kilometre pipeline along the Dallepipal-Kalipul-Beni Ring Road and in the Darbang Bus Park area to restore the supply.
As the existing system struggles to meet demand, residents of Red Cross Marga in Beni Bazaar have started fetching water from private sources.
According to Giri, an estimated Rs 147 million is needed for immediate improvements to the water supply system, while a long-term plan would require around Rs 700 million.
Last week, committee officials submitted a proposal to Minister for Infrastructure Development Sunil Lamsal, seeking funds to rebuild and upgrade the drinking water project.
Lamsal, who visited Beni Bazaar last week, pledged to arrange the necessary budget and rebuild the Beni drinking water project through a contract-based process, according to the committee.
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